Reliability in Short Supply

Some years ago, a boss of mine had a sign hanging in his office that was simple yet profound:  "The best ability is dependability." Implicit in that statement is the value one places on honesty, integrity and commitment. Unfortunately, these three key ingredients to a well-functioning society are increasingly absent in our communities, our states and our nation. The year 2009 will be remembered as a year of spectacular meltdowns —economic, political, celebrity, you name it. And at the center of each meltdown, there was a notable absence of honesty and integrity.

Much of the current ethical climate can be laid at the feet of the "mainstream" media. They have so colored the way the news is covered that the real truth on any issue is a rare find indeed. A prime example of this is the coverage of Obama's war in Afghanistan.

If memory serves, the moment Richard Nixon took the oath of office, the Vietnam War was his. Didn't matter that Lyndon Johnson left him a mess, far worse than anything George W. Bush left Obama. The left wanted us out of Vietnam yesterday, no matter the consequences. That Nixon adopted a "Vietnamization" strategy that gave increasing responsibility to the South Vietnamese military didn't matter. It was not enough and never could be.

Fast forward to 2009, and Obama is allowed months to dither about what if anything he's going to do in Afghanistan. In the mean time, the media allows administration hacks and Obama himself to claim it's still Bush's war or, to use the overused euphemism, "the last eight years," which to any liberal is the worst eight-year period in our nation's history. The largely hidden truth about our new "strategy" in that war, brilliantly exposed by Joseph Farah, founder and columnist for World Net Daily, is that there are far more restrictions on our troops in Afghanistan than were ever dreamed of in the micro-managed Vietnam War. What this means is that Obama has created his own Vietnam by tying the troops' hands behind their backs while at the same time providing an 18-month window for them to get the job done and leave. Surely our enemies (the Taliban and al-Queda) are reveling in what our commander-in-chief is doing to effectively deny our forces the victory that they deserve and America needs.

On another front, this year we've had numerous articles on these pages proclaiming the fallacy of so-called man-made climate change. And much of this was well before the exposure of the East Anglia Climate Research Unit e-mails that proved the hoax once and for all. Still, Obama jets over to Copenhagen and, mantra-like, repeats the tired old talking points about MMCC as settled science and a grave crisis that must be addressed as such. Ultimately, he is castigated by the likes of Hugo Chavez for not going far enough in capitulating to the world's demands that America pony up huge dollars for this imagined crisis. So he's gaining little traction with the U.N. elites even by parroting the lies about MMCC.

We've heard also that annual Battleground polls continue to show the majority of Americans consider themselves "conservatives." However, it's clear that many of them do not vote as such. Those who do not vote as conservatives need a serious dose of truth in reporting that is so sadly lacking these days. That is a great reason, even if there was no other, for us to soldier on in bringing the truth about the issues of the day to these pages.

Another recent article thoughtfully parallels the spectacular downfall of a sports "god" (Tiger Woods) with the more gradual but inevitable downfall of a political "god" (Obama). Obama's presidency, if it does no other good, may hopefully show the public how destructive our celebrity-obsessed culture has become, and that we cannot afford to elect a president on the strength of his or her "celebrity" power.

With that, I would like to thank all of our contributors for their continued excellent articles that expose the utter corruption and incompetence of the current administration. We've had such a continuous flow of articles that it seems a shame to shut down for even one week. However, to honor an annual tradition to celebrate the birth of Jesus with our families, we will not publish on December 28, 2009. We will return in early 2010 more ready than ever to report on the administration's and Congress' continued efforts to foist their socialistic agenda on us, and to hopefully assist in barricading against their current and future endeavors.

A very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all.